Hit Play Not Pause

Anyone who’s ever hit the wall at mile 19 of a marathon or fizzled out on a Fran at CrossFit, knows how important glucose (aka sugar) is for energy–both mentally and physically. As women in the menopause transition, we also know that managing generally healthy blood sugar levels can be more challenging as we can become more carbohydrate sensitive and insulin resistant as our hormones decline. This...

We all want to belong. That desire can increase during the menopause transition, when having a community to share experiences with helps us feel less alone. But making those connections isn’t always easy, especially when culture doesn’t include you. This week’s guest, long time athlete Elizabeth Allen, who identifies as a Black, plus-sized GenXer (who is also now firmly in the menopause transition...

For far too long, many of us have defined ourselves (or worse our self worth) by the size of our thighs and the circumference of our waistline, setting ourselves up for a lifelong battle with our bodies and an underlying discontent with who we are based upon a largely unattainable “ideal.” That can get worse during the menopause transition when our body shape starts to shift. This week’s guest, Ka...

Sometimes life sidelines us, knocking us off the path we thought we’d be on forever, or at least for the foreseeable future. Menopause can certainly trip us up. But so can many other random, sometimes terrible, events we never saw coming. And sometimes we end up contending with all of it. This week’s guest, Jennifer Maxwell, knows all about that and talks about how she has maintained her athletici...

What do you do when menopause turns you into a nearly unrecognizable version of yourself? If you’re Gina Ransom, you pore through every resource you can find, advocate for yourself and others in the same situation, and form a community so you all can keep on kicking ass.  Gina is a lifelong fitness professional who was blindsided by depression, anxiety, anger, as well as a host of physical sy...

It’s easy to look at the barriers we face and think, “I can’t.” Leah Goldstein is here this week to show you, you can. Leah won the Race Across America (RAAM) outright last year at age 52, beating the next closest man by 17 hours. But that barely scratches the surface of her myriad accomplishments and the indomitable spirit that we dive into on the show this week. Leah was the World Kickboxing Cha...

Running is a coping mechanism for many trauma survivors. You lace up and put one foot in front of the other for solace and escape. But what happens when you hit menopause and the demons start to catch up? This week’s guest, coach and endurance athlete Athena Farias talks about all that and more this week as she unpacks how the symptoms she’s facing during the menopause transition are magnified by...

Menopause can be a wet blanket for competitive athletes. How do you keep showing up to start lines when you’re managing hot flashes, heat intolerance, poor sleep, and watching peers walk away from the sport? This week’s guest has some answers. A lifelong athlete and self proclaimed triathlon addict, Julie Dunkle, now in her mid 50s, has had to navigate a number of physical and emotional challenges...

Most of us–even the most active among us–are limited in how well we move. Sure we can run or ride a bike or lift heavy sh*t, but can we balance on a beam or jump over fallen logs? Can we move with strength and fluidity in every direction? Can we go over, under, and through obstacles with ease? Unless we practice, the answer is likely no. This week’s guest, Dr. Julie Angel, who has completed the wo...

Your brain is your largest--and arguably your most important--sex organ. It’s also the most overlooked, especially during the menopausal transition when we spend a whole lot of time talking about our vaginas (which are important, too, of course!). This week’s guest Kelly Casperson, MD, talks about all of it in a show that drives home the mind-vagina connection during menopause and midlife. Dr. Cas...

Hormone therapy for menopause is rife with confusion, fear, misunderstanding, and outright misinformation. Even doctors, who are often relying on long debunked research, can be at a loss to help women make educated choices for their health, well-being, and performance during this time. This week’s guests, Drs. Avrum Bluming and Carol Tavris, authors of Estrogen Matters go to great lengths to descr...

Longevity in sport takes determination, curiosity, and the ability to adapt to what your mind and body needs as time goes on. That’s the embodiment of professional triathlete, mountain bike racer, coach, and 5x world champion Melanie McQuaid, who continues to kick ass through the menopause transition, placing 3rd at Ironman Chattanooga and 10th at Xterra World Championships in Maui this year. Mela...

“Who am I now?” That’s an identity crisis many of us face during the menopausal transition, especially if we end up taking a step back from our primary sport or activity to figure out what we want from athletics in this next phase of life. This week’s guest, life and wellness coach Lisa Hesse, helps active and athletic women define themselves and find solid ground during the “lifequake” of menopau...

“Menopause Is Hell. It Also Made Me a Better Climber.” That’s the title of a feature article written in Outside magazine by this week’s guest and legendary outdoor sport athlete Jeannie Wall. We dig into what that piece is all about and address topics of fear, anxiety, rage, hot flashes, night sweats, fatigue, and the power, yes the power, of invisibility. Jeannie spent decades as a world class sk...

Joint pain, hot flashes, night sweats, crushing fatigue. Menopause can usher in a host of symptoms that make daily life challenging, let alone daily life on top of training and racing as a recreational athlete, being a mom, and managing a business. But with knowledge, practice, and patience, it can be done. This week’s guest, Registered Sports Nutritionist, ultra-runner, mom of four, and owner of...

Women make testosterone. It works in concert with estrogen and progesterone to maintain healthy muscles and bones and fires up your sex drive and helps protect your brain. Yet there are no FDA approved testosterone products for women and “T” is not included in standard menopausal hormone therapy. So women are left to their own devices, and reasonably have a lot of questions about when they might n...

Our performance nutrition needs change during the menopause transition. Few know that better than women who both teach it and live it as athletes and sports dietitians, like this week’s guest ​​Lauren Antonucci, RDN, CSSD, author of High-Performance Nutrition for Masters Athletes. Along with being a sports nutritionist, Lauren is a runner, an Ironman athlete, and a mom of three. Once she hit perim...

Bunions and bone spurs and heel pain, oh my! Foot pain in all shapes and forms is extremely common and becomes more so as we enter the menopause transition and our estrogen declines, taking our collagen production with it, which impacts the dozens of joints and tendons in our feet. That’s important because our feet are literally the foundation of nearly every physical activity we do. This week’s g...

As active women we know all about our muscles. We know the sets and reps to work our shoulders, glutes, and core. We’re proficient in using dumbbells, kettlebells, and squat racks. But when it comes to training our pelvic floor, we know one word: Kegels. That’s not enough. In fact, if our pelvic floor is a “Lock Down Donna” as this week’s guest would say, Kegels may be the last thing we need. Our...

Never underestimate the power of menopausal women. Their years of experience and deep well of physical and mental strength uniquely positions them to move mountains--or at least a fully loaded dragon boat weighing more than a ton. This week’s guests Chris Head, a newbie dragon boat racer with the Dragon Divas, a team of Breast Cancer survivors and Connie Flesuras, longtime coach at Dragon Boat Tra...

As a woman you can lose up to 20% of your bone density during the five to seven years following menopause. Given the fact that we hit peak bone density by age 30, we can’t go back in time and build more, but we can take steps right now to hang onto what we have to keep our skeleton strong and resilient. This week we bring in two guests from the Hospital for Special Surgery in New York City to expl...

Happy birthday to Hit Play Not Pause! As a special gift, past guest, personal trainer, and healthy ageing coach Tania Dalton turns the tables and interviews host Selene Yeager for a 1 year anniversary bonus edition of the podcast. The two dive deep into Selene’s background as an accidental athlete turned professional level cyclist as well as her career writing about health, fitness, and endurance...

Whether we run, ride, swim, or practice martial arts, at some point we can feel like we’re nearing the end of the line with how far we can go. That’s especially true when menopause and midlife put us in a Malachi crunch. But maybe what feels like an endpoint is really the starting point of something exciting and new. That’s how this week’s guest, legendary cyclist Mari Holden views this stage of l...

Your brain is your largest--and arguably your most important--sex organ. It’s also the most overlooked, especially during the menopausal transition when we spend a whole lot of time talking about our vaginas (which are important, too, of course!). This week’s guest Kelly Casperson, MD, talks about all of it in a show that drives home the mind-vagina connection during menopause and midlife. Dr. Cas...

Races are about more than winning. Competing is about more than podium spots or fastest times. Races are about personal bests and striving to be your best, whether that’s first place or 571st place. In fact, the person who comes in last may have overcome more, learned more, and grown more from the event than the one who came in first. This week’s guest Adina O’Neill, a self-described “back of the...